When going to an indoor meet, the differences in the building compared to other buildings you have flown in can create new challenges or new advantages. The thought always goes through my mind, I wish I could fly here regularly, or the opposite, my site is superior to this one. This is one of the reasons I've put these two videos on our website. These videos were taken at Memorial Hall in Racine, Wisconsin. This is the Bong Eagles indoor flying site. They have arranged for open flying here on the first Thursday of the month from October through May. They also hold two annual contests here. It's a great category II site. It has a few obstructions on it's 39 foot ceiling, but as with any indoor site, you learn how to fly around them. Of course, it would be better if it was ten feet taller, because it would still be category II. In the second video, Kurt pans the building, and you can see how great the complete flying site is. There are more pictures of the building on their website. Their website is available on our Links Page.

The plane is an unlimited glider. It's a copy of Stan Buddenbohm's Slow Poker. Since the plane originally was a handlaunch glider, it has been modified for catapult. All dimensions are the same. It is built from the plans in Model Aviation, June 1992 Edition. I made two minor modifications. I added a wedge piece to the nose to hook the catapult rubber band to. I also added a tab on the fuselage at the CG point to hold while shooting it up. It also has two major modifications. I added two more dihedral joints to the wing, making it a four-piece wing. I did this to add washout to the outer wing panels, as described in our article Basic Glider Physics Washout. The other major modification was gluing the center of the wing together, so it is no longer a flapper. I have built two of these catapult Slow Poker gliders. Stan's Slow Poker weighed 6.2 grams. Both of mine weigh 7.4 grams. As you watch the two videos, you will see the flights are almost identical. They were taken at the start of the January flying session. It was a chilly winter evening in Wisconsin. The floor is empty. Some rubber flyers have arrived, and since it takes them longer to get a plane in the air, I had the building to myself. Kurt took the video with a camera he received for Christmas.

You will notice the transition is about five feet from the top of the ceiling. As the night went on, I slowly got it higher, and made other minor trim changes. The best time I turned in this January session was 46.4 seconds. Kurt has turned 50 seconds in this building. This being the second session in which I flew this plane, I hope to improve the time in the future. However, 3.6 seconds is a lot to gain. Maybe if I made it a flapper, with the original dihedral design, and built it a little lighter like the plans specify, it would do the 50 seconds. That's what makes this hobby interesting.

Loading JW Player...

Loading JW Player...